Stumble [Rewrite]

Ceremonious

...

His superior could wait. Just this once.

Driven by suspicion, Kakashi took to the rooftops and trailed after her. The girl took an unusual route of alleys and backlots to reach the civilian sector and enter one of the apartment complexes. He watched her from a far off distance, letting a frown befall his lips. So that's how it was; how foolish of him to think otherwise. He turned his back on the complex, taking one last glimpse at it before returning to HQ.

The girl was more than likely one of those unfortunate enough to carry the title of prodigy.

::

Ibiki took a rag from his back pocket to wipe the blood from his hands and the small spatter on his cheek. The action itself wasn't tedious, but it took time to weed the information they wanted out of the person they were working on. That meant he had even more papers piled up for him, inevitably doubling his desk work.

Sometimes it sucked being the T&I Director. In addition to all the extra time he was putting in, he now had to deal with the matter of his dwindling interrogation force. There just weren't enough efficient bodies for the job and lately, they've had a surge of shinobi in need of "questioning". Hell, all their holding cells were filled! He was lucky he had the tokubetsu jounin to try to subdue the problem.

It was hard to get people into the force. Shinobi they might be, but many of them still stood by the fact that one shouldn't torture a person for information. Konoha shinobi held a sort of honor to them, believing that there shouldn't be blood on their hands where blood wasn't due. It was a downfall in Ibiki's eyes. Konoha was too nice and peace-loving where only the elite had the mental capability to get the job done.

He paused for a moment when a pair of calculative green eyes flashed in his mind.

No, he couldn't do that.

... Could he?

When thinking of suitable candidates for recruitment, he could help himself from thinking of his student. Sakura was supposed to be exclusive in intelligence because of her advanced smarts and talent. That was all. But her abnormal ability didn't just have to apply to one specialized part of the sector. One could plainly see that she could be lethal with any path, or paths, she chose.

Her parents wouldn't agree to it, surely. Mebuki and Kizashi were law abiding citizens with good hearts that wanted nothing but the best for their daughter.

"Shiranui," Ibiki said as he entered his office. Genma looked up from his spot on the couch, capping his pen and rolling the scroll on his lap.

"Yeah?"

"How is Sakura progressing in her physical training?" he asked. The other man leaned back in his seat and stretched his arms over his head.

"Man, I feel like there's nothing to teach the kid. Remember what I told you before? Was able to tree walk her first try, walked on water the first try, created three clones on her second try, has 100% throwing accuracy-- I bet her that if she was able to use the Shinju Zanshu Jutsu, you know the one where you hide underground and pull your enemy neck deep into the ground, that I would buy her lunch for a whole week. Brat caught me not even an hour after the training session," he grumbled. "She's a freakin' machine. I don't know, I think we're gonna have to up her lessons to jounin level."

Ibiki sat behind his desk and began to slowly tap his fingers on the wooden surface. "And we will."

Genma moved his attention to his friend. There was a contemplative gleam to the interrogator's face, one people rarely saw. He hadn't known Ibiki too well until he discovered Sakura and directed her to the first person he thought could handle her. That probably wasn't the best course of action, he admitted, but it all worked out in the end as far as he was concerned. In the year and a half he began to get to know the guy, he'd been able to pick out some tells about what he might be thinking.